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“An impenetrable mystery surrounds the whereabouts of Arlie Latham, the great third baseman of the Brownstocking Club.”

In two days, the defending American Association champion Browns were scheduled to play a preseason “World’s Championship” series with the National League champion Chicago White Stockings, and Latham was missing.

The paper said there were “wild-eyed” rumors that Latham had arrived in town and was at the home of his mother in law, “Mrs. Garvin, No. 2315 Chestnut Street.”

Arlie Latham

The Garvin’s next door neighbor even “came downtown…and stated positively that he had seen Latham on (April 3) walking around the yard and removing clothes lines from the back fence or engaged in some equally domestic occupation.”

The paper said there were several stories circulating about Latham:

“(T)hat (Browns) President (Chris) von der Ahe had seen him and knows that he is here…(they) understand each other and have prepared a big surprise for the audience at the opening game…and that all the differences between them as to salary has been amicably settled.”

Or:

“Latham is laid up at his wife’s mother’s house on Chestnut Street and is suffering with malarial fever.”

Or:

“The present abode of Latham (is) a mystery.”

The final story was based on the fact that “numerous letters” were waiting for Latham unclaimed at the Laclede Hotel “where he generally stops when in the city.”

The paper sent a reporter to the Garvin house to interrogate Latham’s mother in law:

“The bell was answered by the lady herself, who when Latham was asked for, replied:

“’Mr. Latham is not here.’

“’When did he leave?’

“’Last fall some time.’”

Mrs. Garvin said she had received a letter the da before from her daughter who she said was in Lynn, Massachusetts.

Mrs. Garvin asked the reporter:

“’What interest do you take in Mr. Latham?’

“Don’t you know the Browns are going to play the Chicagos Thursday?’

“’No, I didn’t know anything about that.’”

The reporter told Mrs. Garvin there were reports Latham had been seen at her home:

“’Well, I can’t see how anybody could say such a thing.’”

The Post-Dispatch then sought an answer from the Browns owner:

“Extensive questioning could bring no definite answer from President von der Ahe regarding the mystery.”

The Browns owner did tell the paper:

“No, you can put that down positively he has not signed with the club, and what’s more I’m not going to come to his terms.’

“’What does he want?’

“’Well, he says he won’t play with us this year unless I pay him $2800, and I’ll never do that.”

von der Ahe

According to von der Ahe, he offered Latham $2500 for the season:

“’I’ve made him an offer that is sufficiently good for his services, and if he doesn’t want to sign for that, he needn’t.’”

When the Browns opened the series, Latham was still missing. Eight thousand people turned out for the first game against Chicago and Lou Sylvester played third. The Browns lost six to three.

But, apparently, the reports that Latham was in town were incorrect.

The Post-Dispatch said von der Ahe received a telegram from Latham during the game saying he would be in St. Louis that evening.

The Chicago Tribune said Latham accepted $2500 for the 1887 season.

Latham arrived in St. Louis on the evening of April 7, and started for the Browns the next day, The Post-Dispatch said:

“Latham shows up in excellent for and guards their third bag.”

He went 0 for 2 with two walks in a seven to four Browns victory.

The White Stockings won the series four games to two. Latham hit .440 with 11 hits in 25 at bats. The regular season started the day after the series.

The Browns won another American Association championship in 1887, finishing 14 games ahead of the Cincinnati Red Stockings.

Latham, arguably, had his best season. He hit .316, and with the loose scoring for stolen bases in 1887 he had 129.

The paper said Walsh Jr. “fulfilled an ambition the father had nurtured for 23 years.”

The older Walsh, who had just joined the team as a coach, told the paper:

“As soon as he was able to toddle around he wanted to play ball…He always wanted to be a pitcher too. I guess most boys do, but if they can’t pitch they‘ll play somewhere else. Not this boy though. He wanted to pitch all the time.”

Walsh talked about what he taught his son:

Jr.

“I’ve drummed three things into him—control, so he can lay the ball in there where he wanted it; studying the hitters, so he could always be ahead of him, and fielding his position, so he could help himself in a lot of plays where he’d be lost if he wasn’t a good fielder. And I told him, too, never to forget there were seven men out in the field behind him, and not to try to throw every ball past the hitters.”

The younger Walsh was signed by the Sox in June, after pitching at Notre Dame, where his father was also his pitching coach. Big Ed said:

“I never had to tell him to practice or to hustle. He loves baseball too much for that He played ball every minute he could and as he grew up he improved until I don’t think there was a better pitcher in any of the colleges as he was at Notre Dame.”

Walsh said his son was 25-3 during his college career and “won twenty-five games and lost six” for a semi-pro team in the Massachusetts/Rhode Island based Blackstone Valley League between the end of Notre Dame’s season and before he joined Chicago.

One feature of Walsh’s first start was that manager Ray Schalk, started the game behind the plate—one of only two games he appeared in and his only start, The Chicago Tribune said;

“(Schalk) made his first start of the year in his old place so that he might boast of having caught two generations of the Walsh family.”

Walsh Jr. lasted just four innings, giving up five runs in fourth after walking three straight batters.

Regarding his son’s first game, Walsh told The Daily News:

“He pitched his first game for the Sox against the Browns…got off to a good start and then got into a jam and had to be taken out. Maybe he was overanxious and was missing the plate, though Cracker Schalk who caught him, told me afterward that he really had struck out the three men who got bases on balls. Anyway, it doesn’t matter now, though naturally I would have liked to see him win his first game.”

Sr.

Schalk resigned as Sox manager the same day.

Ten days after his debut, Walsh won his first game. His father said:

“Then, last Saturday in Boston, he beat the Red Sox. Gave them only six hits and the two runs they got came in the first inning before a man was out. When he settled down he was great and three of the hits they got off him were scratches.”

Walsh said of the experience watching his son’s first victory:

“I can’t tell you how much of a kick I got out of that game. No game I ever pitched meant half as much to me. I wasn’t nervous. I’d seen him pitch against some pretty good hitters and I had confidence in him, but every inning had a thrill for me. There he was at last, winning a game in the American League. At that moment I didn’t care if ever won another one—and I’d been waiting for it for twenty-three years.

“He’s got a fast ball, a curve ball and a knuckle ball, and the Boston players told me after the game his fast ball was very deceptive.”

The Daily News predicted great things for the younger Walsh:

“(He is) a magnificent looking young man, slightly more than six feet tall and weighing about 190 pounds, apparently has the stuff, the poise, and the judgment he needs. If he has a heart as stout as his father’s he’ll be a great pitcher, too.”

Walsh could not match his father’s success. He pitched parts of four seasons with the White Sox posting an 11-24 record and 5.57 ERA in 79 major league appearances.

Ed Walsh was just 32 years old when he died in 1937 of a heart ailment.

Four months before Wilson’s death (in 1948, at age 48) and broke, after he was promoted by the city of Baltimore from laborer to swimming pool manager, told a reporter from the Associated Press:

“I guess getting back into baseball is all I think about now, but so far I haven’t had much success. I’ve written to almost all the important men I know, but the answer is always the same—‘sorry, we’re all filled up.'”

Wilson talks with Baltimore children at the municipal pool he managed, July 1948

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According to the International News Service, during a discussion before a game in 1919, Frank Baker was talking to his Yankees teammates about “the days when batters demanded the sort of delivery they could hit best.”

Babe Ruth

The players agreed:

“If that rule were in force in the present day the outfielders would have to be mounted on motorcycles, and Muddy Ruel said that the playing field would have to be as big as the parade grounds at old Camp Pike, where he was at officers training camp.

Just imagine Babe Ruth coming up with the bases filled and a hit needed if he had the privilege of demanding a fastball waist high. The question of how to pitch to him under such conditions was placed in open discussion. Ping Bodie solved it. ‘I’d get back on second base, throw the ball and then duck,’ said Ping.”

Negotiating with Murphy

When it was first rumored that Fred Mitchell would step down as president of the Chicago Cubs in the summer of 1919, there was speculation that Charles Webb Murphy might return to the club as president (Bill Veeck Sr. was ultimately given the position)

Hearing word of Murphy’s possible return, Johnny Evers told The Sporting News what it was like to negotiate a contract with Murphy after the team’s back to back World Series wins in 1907 and 1908:

Charles Webb Murphy

“We had made lots of money for the Cubs and certainly expected owner Murphy to give us a big boost in salary. I received my contract, gave it the once over and returned it to C.W. with the curt reply that I thought I deserved more money for my labors.

“It was not a big salary, In fact, the sum mentioned was so small that if I were to tell you the amount it would shock you. Mr. Murphy was shrewd enough to get around my request for a raise. His reply was to the effect that I might deserve more money, but should be satisfied to work for the amount he mentioned in view of the fact that I had such wonderful stars to help me as Frank Chance on my left and Joe Tinker on my right.

“Joe Tinker also protested against the figures mentioned in his contract that year and the crafty Mr. Murphy’s reply to him was that he should be satisfied to play for almost anything since he was teamed up with such stars as (Harry) Steinfeldt on his right, Evers on his left and Frank Chance at first base. There was no way to get around an argument like that, and when the season opened Tinker and I were playing at the original figures offered by chubby Charley.”

Arguing with Browning

The Louisville Courier-Journal recalled in 1908 an incident “When Pete Browning played with the Louisville club.”

Browning, said the paper, was “no prize beauty…still he was sensitive regarding his un-Apollo like appearance and would get angry in a moment if any allusion was made to his lack of pulchritude.”

Pete Browning

During a game in Cincinnati, umpire John Gaffney called Browning out on strikes.

“The big fellow rushed up the umpire roaring like a toreador stuck bull. But John Gaffney was afraid of no living man, and he ruled the field with a rod of iron, but he was also a reasonable man and would explain his decisions. However, Pete would listen to no explanations. Finally, Gaffney became angry, and walking up to Browning, he shook his finger in his face and said:

“’I would like to have a photograph of your face, Browning.’

“’And for why,’ shot back Pete, who was taken wholly by surprise, and began to color up when allusion was made to his face.

“’Why, I have a chicken farm back home,’ said Gaffney, ‘and I would like to put your picture in the coop so as to frighten eggs out of the hens.’”

Two things were certain after George Baumgardner’s major league debut—a 4 to 1 victory over the Big Ed Walsh and the Chicago White Sox—he had talent, and he was a bit odd.

The Chicago Tribune said:

“He had a lot of speed. The best thing he had was splendid control. He seemed able to cut the ball across any portion of the plate except the middle, and he seldom gave the Sox a chance to belt a good one, yet he was getting them over for strikes.”

The Chicago Daily News said Baumgardner was told it was a big deal that he had beaten Walsh:

“’Who is this fellow Walsh?’ he asked. He was told that Big Ed is considered by many the greatest pitcher in the game. ‘If he’s so good why don’t some National League clubs draft him?’ Inquired Baumgardner innocently. He has since been told that the American League, in which he promises to earn fame, is a major organization just like the National.”

Baumgardner, 1912

He was 37-47 with a 3.12 ERA in his first three seasons for Browns teams that lost 101, 90, and 88 games.

However, he was sent home by the Browns after appearing in just seven games in 1915—he was 0-2 with a 4.43 ERA.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch said, the pitcher “has hit the lonesome trail of the West Virginia pines…and has been advised to go home and get in shape.”

After the 1915 season, American League umpire Billy Evans said in his nationally syndicated column that, “Baumgardner…ought to be one of the greatest pitchers in baseball, but he is not, and thereby hangs a rather interesting tale.”

Evans said:

“Baumgardner has wonderful speed and a beautiful curve. He is fleet of foot and a corking good fielder. There are in the major leagues today any number of pitchers rated as stars who do not possess one-half the natural ability.”

Evans said in addition to his slow start, the Browns gave up on the pitcher so easily because of the financial stress the Federal League had caused American and National League clubs:

“Baumgardner’s salary was surely $4,000 or better, because George Stovall tried to sign him for the (Kansas City) Feds. Stovall, having managed the Browns (Stovall jumped to Kansas City before the 1914 season) was familiar with Baumgardner’s ability. There are few players who would let such a salary slip away from the without making some effort to retain it.”

Evans claimed that after they sent him home, the Browns never heard from their pitcher, and “his whereabouts during the summer was unknown,’ to the team.

“The only news ever received from the eccentric pitcher came through a St. Louis traveling man, who made the small towns in the south. He bumped into Baumgardner in a West Virginia hamlet pitching for one of the village clubs. He watched him perform, said he never looked better; so good in fact he could have gotten a long without his outfield.”

Evans said the man asked the pitcher if he had been in touch with the Browns:

“’I am waiting to hear from them,’ was Baumgardner’s reply. ‘I guess if they really thought they could use me they would have me rounded up. I ain’t much on letter writing; they don’t need to expect any word from me.”

Evans said:

“It hardly seems possible that in times of war, when big salaries were almost possible fir the mere asking, a fellow would let it get away from him (but) nothing worries the big fellow, it is easy come, easy go with him.”

Baumgardner’s 1916 season was even more unusual than 1915. He again reported to the Browns out of shape, and struggled.

In June, the Browns attempted to sell him to the Memphis Chickasaws in the Southern Association. The Post-Dispatch said:

“George Baumgardner of Barboursville, WV, the heart of the Blue Ridge belt, is all puffed up like a pouter pigeon because he has signed a new contract with the Browns. All of which proves how easy it is to get Baumgardner all puffed up.

“This contract, which Baumgardner considers and asset, according to his own statement, calls for $75 a month.”

The paper said Baumgardner would have earned $200 a month with the Chickasaws, but told manager Fielder Jones:

“Who’ll ever see me pitch in Memphis?”

Baumgardner lasted just one more month in St. Louis. He appeared in four games for the Browns and posted a 7.88 ERA before being released on July 20.

The Sporting News said the Browns attempted send Baumgardner to the Little Rock Travelers, where he would have earned $250 a month and he again said he wasn’t interested:

“But even that ($75 a month) was too much, thought Fielder Jones, so one day last week he handed Baumgardner another release, his second or third in three months, and told him positively to get away and stay away.”

Baumgardner said his right arm had “gone back on him,” and that he was going to “go back to the mountains and practice with my left arm.”

After several days he joined the Travelers.

He only lasted a month in Little Rock. Baumgardner was 2-1 in five appearances on August 21 when The Arkansas Democrat said he was heading back to West Virginia:

“(He) says he is going home this week and stay there until next season—maybe. Or he may come back and help the Travelers in the last few days.”

Baumgardner promised the paper he would return and “not lose more than four games” in 1917.

Baumgardner, 1917

The Arkansas Gazette summed up his 1917 season:

“Every time “Bummie” goes out he gets a beating.”

And he didn’t keep his word. He lost five games in 1917, winning three, before being released by Little Rock on June 7.

After winning 37 games in his first three major league seasons, Baumgardner’s professional career was over six weeks before his 25th birthday.

After Swede Risberg and Chick Gandil alleged in late 1926 that the Detroit Tigers had thrown four games to the Chicago White Sox late in the 1917 season—a story that was contradicted by more than two dozen former Tigers and White Sox players—Ty Cobb told Bert Walker of The Detroit Times that the St. Louis Browns likely threw the final three games of the season against the Tigers in 1923.

Cobb

Walker said before the first game of the series on October 1, Browns players approached Cobb and said:

“’You are going to win today’s game. We will not try to take it. Those damned —–, meaning the Indians, have insulted us all season and we hope you beat them out.’”

Cobb told Walker:

“’I was in uniform at the time, and went to the office of (Tigers President Frank) Navin and told him the whole thing. There was still more than an hour in which to get down bets on a sure thing. I do not know if any bets were made or not. I didn’t make any bets but we won the game.’”

The Tigers swept the season-ending series three game series with the Browns while the Indians split a four-game series with the Chicago White Sox, resulting in Detroit finishing a half game ahead of Cleveland.

“The Percentage of Those Whom I Have Spiked”

Cobb talked to The Dayton Herald in 1915 about why baseball was not a profession for everyone:

“It is hard to succeed in baseball, not because the game is hard in itself, but because of the rebuffs that a player receives from all sides…Several years ago when I broke into the big show, I was a target for all the remarks sport writers could not fire at anyone else.

“It was simply because when I slid into a base and would put all the force I possessed into my slide, they said I was a rowdy and that I was trying my best to spike the other fellow.

“Well, if the records were kept, it would be shown that the percentage of those whom I have spiked would be no higher than that of any other major leaguer in the game.”

“Sure, I’ll hit, Watch me”

In 1925, Frank G. Menke of The New York Daily News marveled that Cobb was, at age 38, still one of the game’s best hitters—he was hitting above .400 when the article appeared in June and ended up fourth in the American League with a .378 average:

“No man can think of Ty Cobb without gasping over his bewildering ability as a ballplayer.

“There never was a player like him—none remotely approached. And so long as the game endures there shall not be another like him because Cobb is superlative, peerless, and alone.”

Cobb hit 12 home runs that season, tying his highest career output. Menke told the story behind Cobb’s biggest power outburst of the season:

Ty Cobb

“Out in St. Louis (on May 5) some rabid fans proceeded to ‘bait’ Cobb. They jeered him, called him a ‘has-been’—and dared him to do some hitting. Scoffing and sneers take the fight and the heart out of some men; they serve merely as spurs to greater endeavor within others. And Cobb is the latter type.

“’Ty was the most resourceful,’ Young went on. “’He could push, pull, or bunt. Odd thing though, he never could pull an outside pitch, while Wagner could.’”

Smith said:

“Of course, there will never be an end to the argument as to which was the better—Ty or Honus. By why debate it? There’s room for both of them in the game’s Valhalla

“As a carrier of the Wagner standard pointed out: ‘The best hitting shortstop of recent years was Joe Cronin, yet Cronin couldn’t hit within 30 points of him. The best fielding shortstops have been Leo Durocher, Marty Marion, and Lou Boudreau. None of them were slick enough to carry the Dutchman’s glove. Travis Jackson had a rifle arm. Wagner had a better one. No shortstop was ever much of a base-stealer. Old Honus stole 50 or more bags for five straight seasons with a top mark of 61.”

Smith said Wagner told him a story about “the harsh days when he broke in.” Wagner said during his third season (1899), in a game versus the Giants:

“(O)ne of their men smashed a home run.

‘”Nice hit,’ Honus said when the Giant passed by.

“’Go to hell,’ snapped the New Yorker.

“’I felt real good about that,’ Wagner said afterward. ‘He was the first major leaguer who ever spoke to me.’”

“Heinie Zimmerman, the Cubs third baseman stood close by the mound while the kid chucked a few into the catcher. Standing near the plate, swinging a couple of bats and waiting to step in was a big, bowlegged, lantern-jawed individual.

“So, the preliminaries were over, and the new pitcher obeyed orders to the letter. He threw Wagner an outside pitch which Honus promptly belted down the right field line for two bases, scoring all three runners.

“’I thought you said he couldn’t hit an outside pitch,’ the lad snapped at Zimmerman after the dust had settled.

“’I didn’t say he couldn’t hit it,’ Heine replied. ‘All I said was don’t pitch him inside—I’ve got a wife and two kids at home.’”

An advertisement for the October 1950 game between Bob Lemon‘s All-Stars and Satchel Paige‘s All-Stars at Polo Grounds in Palm Springs–later the Spring Training home of the Los Angeles Angels–both the Pacific Coast League and American League clubs, currently known as Palm Springs Stadium.

According to The Desert Sun, Paige instead “(A)ccepted a lucrative offer to pitch a series of Hawaii exhibition games,” and failed to appear in Palm Springs.

Just 639 fans came out to watch Lemon and a team comprised of Indians teammates and PCL players beat the Paige-less Kansas City Royals 9 to 3.

The most notable aspect of the game was Indians second baseman Ray Boone had his wrist broken with a pitch in the first inning–Boone who hit .301 for Cleveland in 1950, hit just .233 in 1951 after the injury.

Billy Rooks was a fixture in Detroit baseball circles in the first decade of the 20th Century. He owned the Utopia Café at the corner of Clifford and Bagley, a hangout for many Tigers and out of town players.

In 1905, he told Frank Cooke of The Detroit News that anyone who thought Rube Waddell was dumb or “green” was mistaken,” (H)e’s the wisest ‘green’ man you ever saw.”

Rube

Rooks told Cooke that Waddell came into the bar when the Athletics were in Detroit in August, and said:

“’Bill, let me take $2.’ I was just starting in and wasn’t very long on change right then, so I told him I couldn’t afford it, but he kept coaxing and I kissed the two goodbye.

“An hour later back came the Rube and he asked for $3 more. I told him I wouldn’t do it, and he finally took off that watch charm which he got for playing with the 1902 pennant winners and throwing it on the bar, said, ‘I guess that’s worth the five all right.’”

Rooks said by the end of the night, Waddell had hit him up for another $5:

“(M)aking $10 that he was into me, but the charm was worth enough to make up for it.”

The following day, Rooks said Athletics manager Connie Mack noticed the charm was missing from Waddell’s watch:

“’I lost it at the park,’ said Waddell. ‘As I was going through the gate I felt something pull and when I looked it was gone. We all tried to find it, but somebody must have stuck it in their pocket.’

“Connie told Rube to hurry over to a newspaper office and have a notice put in with a reward of $10 for the charm, which he did, and then he came up to my place and said, ‘Bill, you send your bartender down to Connie Mack in the morning and tell him he found the charm at the park. He’ll give you your $10 back, and I’ll have the charm and we’ll all quit even.

“I sent the boy down and Connie gave him the $10, and I was glad to get it.”

Rube

A year later, at the end of the 1906 season, Waddell told The News he took a job tending bar for Rooks:

“Rube has signed to tend bar for Billy Rooks at the Utopia Café, and left a large share of his baggage (after the Athletics final road game in Detroit on September 28) to insure his appearance as suds slinger immediately after the American League season

“If Rube keeps his promise, there will be plenty of quasi-baseball news during the winter.

“’Billy and I are old pards,’ said the Rube in discussing his promise…His place here seems to be baseball headquarters, and I think I will find it congenial.”

The paper said Waddell had originally intended to spend the off season in Cleveland, but:

“Utopia is near a fire station, and Billy has promised Rube a fire alarm right back of the bar.”